Date: Mon, 02 Dec 1996 15:26:21 GMT
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<TITLE>Nick on The Information Age</TITLE>
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<H3> This WWW insidious intelligent information mumble debate has got me
thinking.  Here's what I came up with: </H3> <P>

<blockquote>
<B>Warning</B>: this will make a lot more sense if you read
<a href=http://www.cs.washington.edu/homes/pauld/webtech.html>Paul's
comments</A> first! <P>
</blockquote>

<HR> <P>

There are two types of people in the world.  Let us call them <I>Busy
Executives</I> and <I>Just Plain Folks</I><A HREF="#apology">*</A>.
<P>

<I>Busy Executives</I> keep hundreds of projects up in the air at
once. Life for the <I>Busy Executive</I> is always hectic, so they
need to maximize their productivity.  There's no way they can do
everything they have to do each day, so they need to do the most
important things first.  You know what would make a <I>Busy
Executive</I> really happy? Some gizmo to read their email in the
mornings before they get in, take care of the simple tasks, delete
their junk mail, and then (best of all) rank the remaining messages in
priority.  Maybe tie it in to some sort of calendar micromanagement
system whereby the computer tells the <I>Busy Executive</I> she has 3
minutes to send off a message wishing her secretary a happy birthday,
then 12 minutes to send a message to the boss explaining why last
month's performance report will be two days late, then 6 minutes of
the phone with the lawyers, that sort of thing.  <I>Busy
Executives</I> could just come in and get right down to business. <P>

<I>Just Plain Folks</I> are very busy too, but the WWW for them is a
just diversion and occasionally a useful information source.  It is an
interesting but not a necessary or central part of their life.
<I>Just Plain Folks</I> read rec.music.makers.guitar.acoustic and
talk.politics.theory and sci.philosophy.meta.  And they <B>don't</B>
read them because they are are political theorists or guitar crafters
or philosophers of science.  If they missed that really great review
about John Rawl's new book, well, that's OK because next week they'll
probably be around for the discussion of piezo beeper pickups.
<I>Just Plain Folks</I> don't want or need to optimize their quality
time with the WWW not because they managed somehow to be more
efficient that the <I>Busy Executives</I>, but because it just doesn't
matter.  <I>Just Plain Folks</I> don't always want messages that
statistically correlate with the messages they liked in the past.
They just want to kill a half hour.  And they connect to
http://neptune.corp.harris.com/rush.html precisely <B>because</B> they
can't stand Rush Limbaugh... go figure.  <P>

I don't know what to make of these observations.  But here's a couple
of thoughts: <P>

<UL>

<LI> I think the distinction is <B>not</B> between recreational and
"serious" use of the WWW.  More precisely, <I>Just Plain Folks</I>
have a hard time making such a distinction, and <I>Busy Executives</I>
tend to approach their leisure activities with the same demand for
optimality.  <P>

<LI> The point of telling this story here, of course, is that I think
we're at a significant juncture: The current proposal is aimed towards
<I>Busy Executives</I>; no solid proposals have been set forth aimed
at <I>Just Plain Folks</I>. If this distinction matters, now is the
time to find out.<P>

<LI> Yeah, well, OK: maybe I'm the only <I>Just Plain Folk</I> around.
<P>

</UL>

<HR> <P>

One more thing: I've heard estimates that the amount of information
published every year is growing exponentially.  Certainly this
relationship holds for the WWW. <P>

Now suppose we get devise a scheme for filtering all that information
that runs in time that is, say, linear in amount of information in the
world.  Being linear in something that is growing exponentially won't
work. <P>

The counterargument, of course, is that humans make the information,
and they have a limited capacity to make new stuff up, so the rate of
growth of information can't exceed the rate of growth of people
forever.  The reason the growth rates are out of synch now is simply
that the percentage of people on-line is growing (probably
exponetially as well).  The question is: Where are we in this process?
Are we just about to hit the point when information stops growing so
rapidly?  I don't think so.  It may well be the case that within 5
years half the US will be on the net, and we'll be able to handle it
just fine.  But what happens when half of China joins in?  <P>

My prediction: current fantasies about the growth of the WWW are
simply unsustainable.  Somehow my mind keeps slipping back to the days
when the nuclear power industry told us that in the future (read as
"now") electricity would be so cheap they wouldn't even bother to
meter your usage. <P>

<B>This just in.</B> Dan observes that the amount of comptutation is
increasing expoentially as well, so all this is just a red herring.
Fair enough. <P>

<HR> <P>

<A NAME="apology">*</A>My apologies to Jean Lave.

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